top six stories of the last two weeks

Hector Garza announced he had lung cancer and would be leaving wrestling while he fights it. Garza’s last match was at Heroes Inmortales, wrestling in the Copa Pena (royal rumble rules), though he’s since appeared in-ring at a Monterrey show he had been originally been booked on. That bit set up Perro Aguayo Jr. and members of the Garza family challenge each other to a hair vs hair match.

An extended interview with Dorian Roldan and Konnan, previously broadcast over Twitcam, was posted to AAA’s YouTube channel. Of note, they mentioned AAA is now ahead of WWE in the ratings, again put the blame on Paco Alonso for no CMLL/AAA matches, and encouraged aspiring AAA wrestlers to come up with their own gimmicks and provide video when they want to get looked at. They announced Guerra de Titans would be 12/02 in Zapopan, Mexico.

Season 2 of A&E (and CMLL’s) El Luchador premiered, focusing more on family drama than the previous season. The show starts in spring, will climax with Dragon Lee becoming the new Mistico, and strongly hints in that direction from the first scene

AAA announcer Jesus Zuniga said Konnan would be returning to the ring in January 2013. Konnan later indicated it would probably happen in the first quarter of 2013 but not January, which probably means Rey de Reyes.

Fantasy unmasked Mercurio in a battle of lower echelon CMLL minis. It was probably the best match either of them have had. Fantasy used a sit down piledriver for the win after Mercurio had won the first fall that way.

AAA’s second Fusion show appeared to have some entertaining matches – Ricky Marvin & Super Crazy kept the GHC tag titles over Halloween & Daga in a match which left Halloween with rib injuries – but the bigger news was the shockingly low turnout. Only 305 tickets were sold, much less than other, non-televised shows held in the same building.

NJPW’s Naoki Sugabayashi and Tigre Hattori visited Mexico to discuss their upcoming plans with CMLL. Likewise, TNA’s Al Snow & Bruce Pritchard visited Mexico to figure out plans with AAA, and to scout talent for their own promotion.

AAA pushed back it’s next Televisa taping a week to 11/09. No reason was given. It’s headlined by Cibernetico & Mesias vs Perro Aguayo & Texano. Halloween, thought to be out for many weeks, is listed as defending his share of the AAA Mixed Tag Championship.

Teddy Hart was announced as missing that Monterrey show because he suffered a fracture. Hours later, Teddy Hart was wrestling in Edmonton, apparently completely healthy. No one was surprised.

Amapola won the CMLL REINA International championship from Leon.

Volador has a busy week of single matches: cheating to defeat Diamante Azul on Sunday, beating Sombra clean on Monday, then losing via cheating to Sombra on Tuesday. He’s next set up to to defend his share of the national trios titles next week, and generally seems to be one of the center of CMLL’s plans being out of favor for long stretches of last year.

AAA launched a new website.

Hijo de Pirata Morgan won the IWRG Juniors title for a third time, as IWRG continued it’s build to it’s annual Castle of Terror show on 11/02.

Rayo de Jalisco Jr. claimed he never got plane tickets or money for his trip to Monterrey. The promotion sent copies of the plane tickets and deposit to prove he did.

Lizmark Jr. joined Perros del Mal, after a period of not wrestling much at all in Mexico. It appears he may be back to wearing his mask. He lost in an CMLL Anniversary show, but had been wearing as part of Lucha Libre USA.

Mr. Aguila made what was said to be a one time appearance former partner Damian 666 & Bestia 666 on an AAA spot show. Damian insisted it was a last minute fill in deal because X-Fly missed his flight back to Mexico City, but it got people talking (especially since Aguila is now putting his CMLL title on the line in a match.)

Bam Bam returned to CMLL and was immediately injured, slipping off the turnbuckle and landing badly to the apron. He did not look well even before the fall.